Without Her
by ryanmarissaforever88
Summary: Ryan angst after Marissa's death.
1. Chapter 1

**WITHOUT HER**

Author's Note: Read/Review? I know that everyone says that but I really want to know if I should continue or whatever. And, of course, the disclaimer- none of this belongs to me. I wish. If I did, Marissa wouldn't have died, she and Ryan would have lived happily ever after and the OC would still be running. So, obviously, the OC and its characters do not belong to me. Thanks.

He could feel her slipping away from him. He could feel her heart beat slowing down as he struggled to keep her conscious. "It'll be okay." he repeated, over and over. "It'll be okay." The words gradually began to lose their meaning as he allowed himself to realize just how close he was to losing her as he eyed the gash in her head and the blood on her face. "I gotta go get help." he insisted.

"No..Ryan." she struggled to speak. "Stay. Don't leave." Marissa coughed.

Ryan whispered again, "It'll be okay, Riss." At this point, he was only trying to convince himself.

"If...only.." Her eyes were beginning to close, as hard as she fought to keep them open. Her breathing slowed and her heart beat one final drum before coming to a devastating halt.

"Marissa!" Ryan said, panicking. He couldn't lose her. He couldn't. "Marissa!" Shaking her, he tried to make himself believe that she was asleep, that she was unconscious, anything to believe other than the horrifying truth that he was not prepared to acknowledge- his love was dead.

"No.." he whimpered. "No.." His eyes began to tear. Screw the Atwood lesson that crying was for wusses and cowards- Marissa was gone. For the first time, Ryan allowed himself to cry. "No.." he looked down at her body, unmoving, and lying in his arms.

"If only..we had more time." he whispered as his tears began to fall, silently dripping on the face whose beautiful smile he would never see again. "Riss.." he sobbed.

Flashing lights soon appeared around the bend as the ambulances and police car came with their colorful lights and painfully loud sirens. The ambulances came to a halt and some EMT's jumped out of the backs, taking Marissa from Ryan's arms. Ryan pulled her closer, trying to protect her. "No.." he protested. "Don't take her from me.." he pleaded. They took her anyway.

Without the strength to protest, Ryan was examined and taken to the hospital. More tears fell as he noted that, upon entry to the hospital, they took Marissa's stretcher to a different wing than he was being taken to- she was headed to the Morgue. Powerless, he sat in silence as the policemen continued to try and get answers out of him. Taking out his cell phone, he dialed the familiar number. "Sandy, you've got to get down to the hospital." he struggled to form a complete sentence without breaking down. "We had an accident."

"Ryan?" Seth's voice broke him out of his reverie. They were in the kitchen, and it occured to Ryan that Seth was wearing black. "Ryan, it's in half an hour. We should go."

Ryan shook his head and got a bottle of water out of the fridge. It had been four days since the accident. It felt like forever to Ryan. He ignored Seth and walked by him to go back to his solitude in his poolhouse.

"Ryan." Kirsten and Sandy had walked in, dressed in black. "Please go. She would want you to." Kirsten sighed. "You can't hide in the poolhouse forever."

Ryan turned and walked away.

The funeral was beautiful, noted the Cohens. Weeping silently, they all approached Marissa's final resting place. Many people had come to show their respects for the Newport Princess, and the sea of black was large. But not quite large enough that when Ryan stood out of sight with a vodka bottle in hand (Marissa's preferred brand, of course), that he couldn't see. No, Ryan was fully able to see as his his love, his heart, his life, was buried. So close, but so out of reach. And that's when Ryan runs. That's when he walks back to the house as quickly as he can and storms into the poohouse, grabbing his duffle bag and stuffing it full of clothes. Not just any clothes. His Chino clothes. Any clothes he could find that didn't have memories of the Cohens or Marissa attached to them. And so Ryan entered the first bar he could find, looked the guy straight in the eye, and said firmly "I can work full time." The guy hired him on the spot and offered him the run-down appartment in the back. Ryan accepted. The farther he could run from what his life with the Cohens was, the farther he could run from his pain.

Please, please review?


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Note: Read/Review? I know that everyone says that but I'm new to this and I really want to know if I should continue or if you even like it at all (haha). And, of course, the disclaimer- none of this belongs to me. I wish. If I did, Marissa wouldn't have died, she and Ryan would have lived happily ever after and the OC would still be running. So, obviously, the OC and its characters do not belong to me. Thanks. And I know this chapter is kind of short, but two chapters in one day is still pretty good, haha. Don't get used to it..unless I get more reviews! Lol. Review, please?? Thanks.

The first time Ryan heard anything about the back-door business of the bar was about a week after the accident. Two sketchy-looking men had passed by him as Ryan was wiping down a table, about to head back to his apartment (if you could call it that) for the night. "Who're you betting on tonight?" The bigger one asked the other.

"I'm going for the small one. I heard that Phillips is looking a bit tired tonight."

Ryan, whose curiousity was growing, put the dishcloth away and waved to his boss, signalling that he was going to leave as his shift was now over.

Following the men, he found himself going downstairs to a part of the building that Ryan had never ventured to, had never cared to explore. When the door opened, he saw hundreds of people, heard loud cheers and yells and screams of pain. Intrigued, Ryan walked in. Standing still as the crowd flowed around him, he took in everything he saw. Cages. Fighters. Gamblers. Ryan didn't blink when one of the fighters in the cage nearest to him was punched so hard he flew against the side of the cage, catching onto it to hold himself up. He pushed his way through the crowd after staring around for a minute or two, and walked up to a big guy standing at the edge of the cage, looking around apathetically as though this was an everyday occurence for him (which, apparently, it was). "I want in."

He looked at Ryan surprised. "How much? Who're you betting on?"

Ryan shook his head. "No. I want IN. I want to fight."

The guy looked Ryan up and down and smirked. "Okay. Don't blame me if you get killed." He snickered.

The first few times Ryan stepped into the cage, he put up no fight. He allowed punch after punch after punch, just wanting his physical pain to match his emotional pain. All he wanted was for his appearance to match how he felt inside. Shattered. Broken. Like there was nothing left. He gazed approvingly at his bruises and cuts in the mirror in his room and sacrificed his body to his opponent, hoping beyond hope that this time would be the time that would end it all. That he could finally be numb. Ryan just wanted the burden of guilt and pain, anguish and regret, love and heartbreak to disappear. But no matter how many punches he gave up, it never happened.

A loud cheer ran through the crowd when Ryan threw his first punch. It was his sixth fight, and it was the first time that Ryan had done anything except allow himself to be beaten half to death (he never could quite follow through and reach Marissa). There were a few oldies who had seen the fire in Ryan's eyes, had seen the pain there, and knew that soon he would win them money. Every time, they bet on him. And that night, they were right to. Ryan finally threw a punch, and it took his opponent so by surprise that he had to stagger back a few steps before regaining his stance. But those steps sealed his fate. Ryan was on him already, throwing punch after punch, beating him until he was down. He knew that he was in a cage with a total stranger, fighting for money, but when he looked down, all Ryan could see was Volchok, the bastard who had taken Marissa from him. Ryan unleashed all his anger and repressed feelings as he punched and he kicked the jackass who had stolen the love of his life forever. When the big guy blew his whistle, Ryan backed off and rubbed his neck, regaining the visual of the swaying opponent he had just crushed. It wasn't Volchok. He was still out there, but Marissa wasn't. And that was what kept Ryan fighting so passionately, that was what kept him going back to that horrible place. Every time he fought, he pictured every opponent's face as Volchok, wishing so much that every time that whistle blew and his opponent limped away, that if he fought hard enough, he could bring her back. Or that he could really beat Volchok the way that he beat these men who had never done anything to him. It just wasn't fair.


	3. Chapter 3

**THE OC FANFICTION: WITHOUT HER (CH. 3)**

No, this is not the beginning of the chapter yet, but I know (from experience) that nobody really reads the Author's Note- but please do, lol. Author's Note: Read/Review? I know that everyone says that, but I'm new to this and I really want to know if you like it and what you guys think. And, of course, the disclaimer- none of this belongs to me. I wish. If I did, Marissa wouldn't have died, she and Ryan would have lived happily ever after and the OC would still be running. So, obviously, the OC and its characters do not belong to me. Thank you for your reviews! More, please! Haha. Not to be greedy (lol) but I am new to this and need inspiration to keep me going, so please, it only takes a second, just tell me what you think and if you like it! I have a feeling that the more reviews I get the faster I will update..

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When Julie told him that she had information on Volchok's whereabouts, Ryan kept up his poker face. Telling her he didn't want it, he kept up his apathetic facade. When really, he wanted nothing more than to kill the bastard who took his Marissa. But it was better this way, he tried to convince himself. He left before he could give himself away. One sentence echoed in his mind. _"Well, I'm proud of you for not fighting."_ Her sweet voice reverberated in his ears and he could have sworn she was next to him. He would make her proud.

* * *

Ryan slowly pulled out the box from under his bed. It included his most personal belongings- a sweatshirt from Harbor, the CD that Marissa made him for his birthday, and lots of pictures of him and Marissa. He gazed at the sweatshirt briefly, recalling all the memories, good and bad, that the sweatshirt brought up in his mind. He flipped through a few of the pictures before the pain of seeing them when they were so happy together and knowing that it could never be that way again became too much for him to handle. Ryan grabbed the box, running outside to dump its contents in the dumpster. Walking back to his room, he wiped tears furiously from his eyes. "Damn it!!" he yelled. He refused to let his feelings get to him anymore. In his fury, Ryan threw a hard punch at the wall, denting it slightly and causing his knuckles to turn red. But the pain shooting through his hand was nothing to the pain that Ryan was now becoming accustomed to living with.

* * *

When he goes back home with the Cohens, all he had was a duffle bag of stuff and his box. Less than an hour after he tried to free himself from the memories by dumping the box, he realized that those pictures were all he had left of Marissa. And when he got lonely and missed her, he would need to see her smiling face again. Rummaging through the dumpster, he lost a bit of his self dignity, but he knew he would forever regret it if he didn't find those pictures and memorabilia and treasure every single one because it represented a time when they were so in love, and really happy. And he needed those memories more than anything. Because while they never could quite make it work, they both loved each other so much, and those memories reminded him of the few times that they were together and finally able to express that love.

_"The worst feeling is knowing how much you love someone, and how much they love you back, how perfect you are together, for a million unknown reasons, you can't ever be together."_

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When Ryan sees Volchok again, without thinking, his fist is flying through the air and knocking Volchok backwards. He can't repress the images and sounds that are now filling his mind again. Marissa screaming, telling him to pull over. Him telling Marissa to "Hold on!" The car flipping..multiple times. The fire. The leaking gas. Marissa (so broken). Marissa (limp in his arms). Marissa (begging him not to leave). Marissa (gone forever). He is overwhelmed with pain and heartbreak once again as it all comes rushing back at him at once.

Ryan looks at Volchok. "Why did you do it?" he whispered angrily.

Volchok looks upset. "I just wanted you to pull over. It all just got..out of control." He struggled to say as his voice cracked with emotion.

Maybe this guy really did care about Marissa, Ryan thought. But it isn't him that I'm doing this for, he reminded himself. He was here to put things to rest for himself. Because after being there with Marissa when she died, he would never get over it. But he would get used to it.

"But if you want to finish this, I won't fight back." Volchok looked at him, his eyes almost begging Ryan to put him out of his misery.

After a moment of thought, Ryan turned and looked at him seriously. "I'm not doing you any favors. You're going to have to live with what you did." His emotions were suffocating him as he thought back to that night where his world came crashing down around him.

And so Ryan and Volchok walk out of the hotel room together, parting ways silently as Ryan headed over to Sandy and their car and Volchok was finally arrested for the manslaughter of Marissa Cooper, the only girl Ryan ever loved. Gradually the images in his mind faded with the knowledge that Volchok was, at that moment, on his way to serving his time, and again, Ryan heard her sweet voice. _"Well, I'm proud of you for not fighting."_

He hoped he could always make her proud. But as much as Ryan would love to tear apart the person who was the very reason that he would never see the love of his life again, Ryan hated to disappoint Marissa. If he couldn't be with her, he could at least make her proud by not fighting Volchok.

But that doesn't mean that he didn't miss her every second and that every moment that he was without her he wasn't dying inside.

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_"It's agony. Complete, excruciating agony. It's like your heart has been ripped out of your chest and stomped on and you can't breathe.. you don't want to eat, you can't function. It's.. it's the most intense pain that you'll ever feel and the worse part is there's no way to relieve it. It's unyielding merciless torture and you know.. that it's yours for life."_


End file.
